Among the first Drow to adopt handheld firearms were Drow sailors, taking foreign made weapons as trophies after boarding actions and already being at home with black powder artillery. The fact that they offered an single lethal shot at short range with excellent penetration against non runic armor was more than enough to keep them around and between 260 to 180 BIA began making their own. One idea that occurred to Drow Gunsmiths (but was by no means limited to them) was the use of multiple barrels on a single firearm to increase it's rate of fire, at least in the initial phase of battle. One area where this proved to be comparatively popular was in the area of boarding guns.

These weapons were designed specifically for uses in the tight quarters of boarding actions. Boarding guns are shorter than muskets/rifle but longer than most pistols, heavily built, lacked stocks and as a rule have two high caliber barrels for firing bursts of shot. In the heat of battle they would give the user two powerful close range bursts which could let them take out a few enemy sailors before being used as a melee weapon. Some of these weapons had a ring of spikes around their muzzles, others had axeheads or picks, some had frontal spikes that served as crude bayonets. Their butts either had plates to be used as clubs or spikes. Traditionally most of these weapons have been wheellocks

These weapons are never the less not the primary weapon used by drow forces and more commonly by sailors rather than Drow Marines, who favored bows for long range combat, scimitars for close quarters combat and less bulky pistols in close range. Weapons similar to this have been used by non Drow forces as well, some of which are of Drow manufacture but the majority are not. In particular such weapons are frequently used by Dwarves in subterranian warfare and boarding actions when they take to the sea. Historically these weapons used wheellock systems, though flintlock and caplock systems have become more common as time went on due to their superior reliability and there has been some interest in break action breech loading versions of these weapons as well. Never the less while Drow firearms use has significantly increased between 10 and 35 IA, these boarding guns have not and have remained in their niche despite the upgrades they have received. If anything, revolvers have acted as a viable substitute. A few of these items were smuggled into Daagsgrad for use by rebel forces.